Jonathan Franzen Quotes

Freedom is the right to be wrong, not the right to do wrong.

Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.

I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.

Freedom bestows on us the priceless gift of opportunity - if we neglect our opportunities we shall certainly lose our freedom.

With freedom comes responsibility

Liberty means responsibility. That's why most men dread it.

The only freedom I care about is the freedom to do right; the freedom to do wrong I am ready to part with on the cheapest terms to anyone who will take it of me.

The intuition of free will gives us the truth.

Let us prize our freedom; but not use our liberty for a cloak of maliciousness.

If we do not discipline ourselves the world will do it for us.

Responsibility is the price of freedom.

I know what you're going to say! 'They are men, and men should be free.' A free man is dangerous to himself and everyone else. Freedom should be left to those who can put it to good use.

I believe in the freedom of choice in both life and death.

Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself.

Freedom is not the absence of obligation or restraint, but the freedom of movement within healthy, chosen parameters.

Without moral and intellectual independence, there is no anchor for national independence.

Implicit in true freedom of spirit lies a proud and virile will. Such glorious power of free will to choose, envisages beneficent social responsibility as manifest and welcome.

What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do.

If we wish to free ourselves from enslavement, we must choose freedom and the responsibility this entails.

If you tie a man's hands there is nothing moral about his not committing murder.

In the last analysis, our only freedom is the freedom to discipline ourselves.

Freedom is good when the person can use it appropriately. Otherwise it is a disaster.

Liberty is often a heavy burden on a man. It involves that necessity for perpetual choice which is the kind of labor men have always dreaded.

Without freedom there can be no morality.

The more freedom you give people to do good, the more freedom they have to do bad as well.